Zhou Dunyi (or Zhou Lianxi, 1017-1073) occupies a position in the
Chinese tradition based on a role assigned to him by Zhu Xi (1130-1200),[1]
the architect of the Neo-Confucian school that eventually became "orthodox."
According to one version of the Succession to the Way (daotong)
given by Zhu Xi, Zhou was the first true Confucian Sage since Mencius
(4th c. BCE), and was a formative influence on Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi
(Zhou's nephews), from whom Zhu Xi drew significant parts of his system
of thought and practice. Thus Zhou Dunyi came to be known as the "founding
ancestor" of the Cheng-Zhu school, which dominated Chinese philosophy
for over 700 years. His "Explanation of the Diagram of theSupreme
Polarity" (Taijitu shuo), as interpreted by Zhu, became the accepted
foundation of Neo-Confucian cosmology.[2]
Along with his other major work, Penetrating the Classic of Change
(Tongshu), it established the appendices to the Yijing
as basic textual sources of the Neo-Confucian revival of the Song dynasty.
And Zhou's short essay, "On the Love of the Lotus"
(Ai lian shuo), is still a regular part of the high school
curriculum in Taiwan.

Zhou was born to a family of scholar-officials in Hunan province.
After his father died when he was about fourteen, he was adopted by
his maternal uncle, Zheng Xiang, through whom he later obtained his
first government post. Despite the increasing importance of the civil
service examination system in determining status in Song society, Zhou
never obtained the "Presented Scholar" (jinshi) degree. Consequently,
while he earned praise for his service in a very active official career,
he never rose to a high position.

Zhou's honorific name, Lianxi ("Lian Stream"), was the one he gave
to his study, built in 1062 at the foot of Mt. Lu in Jiangxi province;
it was named after a stream in Zhou's home village. He was posthumously
honored in 1200 as Yuangong (Duke of Yuan), and in 1241 was accorded
sacrifices in the official Confucian temple.

During his lifetime, Zhou was not an influential figure in Song political
or intellectual life. He had few, if any, formal students other than
his nephews, the Cheng brothers, who studied with him only briefly when
they were teenagers. He was most remembered by his contemporaries for
the evident quality of his personality and mind. He was known as a warm,
humane man who felt a deep kinship with the natural world, a man with
penetrating insight into the Way of Heaven, the natural-moral order.
To later Confucians he personified the virtue of "authenticity" (cheng),
the full realization of the innate goodness and wisdom of human nature.

Zhou's connection with the Cheng brothers was the ostensible rationale
for his being considered the founder of the Cheng-Zhu school of Neo-Confucianism.
Yet that connection was, in fact, slight. Although they later spoke
fondly of their short time with him and were personally impressed with
him (as were many other contemporaries), the Chengs did not acknowledge
any specific philosophical debts to Zhou. Nor are any such debts evident
in their teachings. In fact, Zhou's teachings were rather suspect in
the eyes of many Song Confucians because of his evident debts to Daoism.
This was especially true during the Southern Song (1127-1279), when
Confucians increasingly defined themselves in opposition to Buddhism
and Daoism. Indeed, Zhou's "Explanation of the Diagram of the Supreme
Polarity" attracted considerable interest among Daoists, and made its
way into the Daoist Canon (Daozang).[3]

Given Zhou's tenuous connection with the Chengs, why then did Zhu
Xi regard him as the first Sage of the Song? The question is significant,
for had it not been for Zhu Xi's estimation of him, Zhou's writings
would almost certainly not have become as central to the Neo-Confucian
tradition as they are. They apparently were not widely known outside
the circle of the Chengs and their students until the twelfth century,
and today the only extant editions besides those edited by Zhu Xi are
the Taijitu shuo in the Daoist Canon and the Tongshu in
another anthology[4] , neither
of which is accompanied by a commentary. So it is safe to say that Zhou
Dunyi's place in the Chinese tradition is largely a creation of Zhu
Xi.[5]

It was the content of Zhou's teachings in relation to Zhu Xi's system
of thought and practice that persuaded Zhu to exalt Zhou Dunyi, to ignore
his Daoist connections, and to stretch the available data concerning
Zhou's affiliation with the Chengs.[6]
Zhu was particularly interested in the relationship between the active,
functioning mind (xin) and its metaphysical substance or nature
(xing), and in the implications of that relationship for moral
self-cultivation. Zhou's writings supported Zhu's position on these
issues by integrating the metaphysical, psycho-physical, and ethical
dimensions of the mind, chiefly by means of the concepts of "Supreme
Polarity" (taiji), "authenticity" (cheng), and the interpenetration
of activity (dong) and stillness (jing).

Translated below are the complete text of his best-known work, the
"Explanation of the Diagram of the Supreme Polarity" (Taijitu shuo)
and six of the forty short sections of Penetrating the Classic of
Change (Tongshu). These works stand on their own as foundational
texts of the Neo-Confucian tradition and as superb examples of the integration
of Confucian ethics and Daoist naturalism.

Zhou's best-known contribution to the Neo-Confucian tradition was
his brief "Explanation of the Diagram of the Supreme Polarity" and the
Diagram itself. The text has engendered controversy and debate ever
since the twelfth century, when Zhu Xi and Lü Zuqian (1137-1181)
placed it at the head of their Neo-Confucian anthology, Reflections
on Things at Hand (Jinsilu), in 1175. It was controversial
from a sectarian Confucian standpoint because the diagram explained
by the text was attributed to a prominent Daoist master, Chen Tuan (Chen
Xiyi, 906-989), and because the key terms of the text had well-known
Daoist origins. Scholars to the present day have attempted to interpret
what Zhou Dunyi meant by them.

The two key terms, which appear in the opening line of the Explanation,
are wuji and taiji, translated here as "Non-Polar" and
"Supreme Polarity."[7]Wuji
had been used in the classical Daoist texts, Laozi (Chapter 28),
Zhuangzi (Chapter 6), and Liezi (Chapter 5). Wu
is a negation, roughly equivalent to "there is not;" ji is literally
the ridgepole of a peaked roof, and usually means "limit" or "ultimate."
So in these early texts wuji means "the unlimited," or "the infinite."
But in later Daoist texts it came to denote a state of primordial chaos,
prior to the differentiation of yin and yang, and sometimes
equivalent to dao.

Taiji was found in several classical texts, mostly but not
exclusively Daoist. For the Song Neo-Confucians, the locus classicus
of taiji was the Appended Remarks (Xici), or Great
Treatise (Dazhuan), one of the appendices of the Classic
of Change (Yijing): "In change there is the Supreme Polarity,
which generates the Two Modes [yin and yang]" (A.11.5).
Taiji here is a generative principle of bipolarity.

But the term was much more prominent and nuanced in Daoism than in
Confucianism. Taiji was the name of one of the Daoist heavens, and thus
was prefixed to the names of many Daoist immortals, or divinities, and
to the titles of the texts attributed to them. It was sometimes identified
with Taiyi, the Supreme One (a Daoist divinity), and with the pole star
of the Northern Dipper. It carried connotations of a turning point in
a cycle, an end point before a reversal, and a pivot between bipolar
processes. It became a standard part of Daoist cosmogonic schemes, where
it usually denoted a stage of chaos later than wuji, a stage
or state in which yin and yang have differentiated but
have not yet become manifest. It thus represented a "complex unity,"
or the unity of potential multiplicity. In the form of Daoist meditation
known as neidan, or physiological alchemy, it represented the
energetic potential to reverse the normal process of aging by cultivating
within one's body the spark of the primordial qi (psycho-physical
substance), thereby "returning" to the primordial, creative state of
chaos from which the cosmos evolved. Chen Tuan's Taiji Diagram,
when read from the bottom upwards, is thought to have been originally
a schematic representation of this process of "returning to wuji"
(Laozi 28), the "Non-Polar," undifferentiated state.

Zhou Dunyi ignored the bottom-up reading of the Diagram, leaving
one or two of its elements unexplained. Focusing on the top-down differentiation
of the cosmos from the primordial unity to the "myriad things," he departed
from a Daoist interpretation by singling out the human being as the
highest manifestation of cosmic creativity, thereby giving the Diagram
a distinctly Confucian meaning. The enigmatic opening line of his Explanation
suggests that the Supreme Polarity, the ultimate principle of differentiation,
is itself fundamentally undifferentiated (this is stated explicitly
a few sentences later). Similarly, activity and stillness, the first
manifestations of polarity, each contains the seed of its opposite.[8]

In bringing this largely Daoist terminology into Confucian discourse
(chaos was generally frowned upon by Confucians), Zhou may have been
attempting to show that the Confucian view of humanity's role in the
cosmos was not really opposed to the fundamentals of the Daoist worldview,
in which human categories and values were thought to alienate human
beings from the Dao. In effect, he was co-opting Daoist terminology
to show that the Confucian worldview was actually more inclusive than
the Daoist: it could accept a primordial chaos while still affirming
the reality of the differentiated, phenomenal world. For Zhu Xi and
his school, the most important contribution of this text was its integration
of metaphysics (taiji, which Zhu equated with li, the
ultimate natural/moral order) and cosmology (yin-yang and Five
Phases).

"Explanation of the Diagram of the Supreme
Polarity" (Taijitu shuo)[10]

Non-polar (wuji) and yet Supreme Polarity (taiji)![11]
The Supreme Polarity in activity generates yang; yet at the limit
of activity it is still. In stillness it generates yin; yet at
the limit of stillness it is also active. Activity and stillness alternate;
each is the basis of the other. In distinguishing yin and yang,
the Two Modes are thereby established.

The alternation and combination of yang and yin generate
water, fire, wood, metal, and earth. With these five [phases of] qi
harmoniously arranged, the Four Seasons proceed through them. The
Five Phases are simply yin and yang; yin and yang
are simply the Supreme Polarity; the Supreme Polarity is fundamentally
Non-polar. [Yet] in the generation of the Five Phases, each one has
its nature.[12]

The reality of the Non-polar and the essence of the Two [Modes] and
Five [Phases] mysteriously combine and coalesce. "The Way of Qian becomes
the male; the Way of Kun becomes the female;"[14]
the two qi stimulate each other, transforming and generating
the myriad things.[14] The
myriad things generate and regenerate, alternating and transforming
without end.[15]

Only humans receive the finest and most spiritually efficacious [qi].
Once formed, they are born; when spirit (shen)[16]
is manifested, they have intelligence; when their five-fold natures
are stimulated into activity, good and evil are distinguished and the
myriad affairs ensue.[17]

The Sage settles these [affairs] with centrality, correctness, humaneness
and rightness (the Way of the Sage is simply humaneness, rightness,
centrality and correctness) and emphasizes stillness. (Without desire,
[he is] therefore still.)[18]
In so doing he establishes the ultimate of humanity. Thus the Sage's
"virtue equals that of Heaven and Earth; his clarity equals that of
the sun and moon; his timeliness equals that of the four seasons; his
good fortune and bad fortune equal those of ghosts and spirits."[19]
The superior person cultivates these and has good fortune. The inferior
person rejects these and has bad fortune.

Therefore [the Classic of Change says], "Establishing the
Way of Heaven, [the Sages] speak of yin and yang; establishing
the Way of Earth they speak of yielding and firm [hexagram lines]; establishing
the Way of Humanity they speak of humaneness and rightness."[20]
It also says, "[The Sage] investigates beginnings and follows them to
their ends; therefore he understands death and birth."[21]
Great indeed is [the Classic of] Change! Herein lies its perfection.

Penetrating the Classic of Change
(Tongshu)

The Tongshu, in forty sections, focuses on the Sage as the
model of humanity. Here Zhou Dunyi defines Sagehood in terms of "authenticity"
(cheng), a term found prominently in the classical Confucian
text, The Mean (Zhongyong). To be authentic is to be true
to the innate goodness of one's nature; to actualize one's moral potential.
Zhou defines authenticity in cosmological terms taken from the appendices
to the Classic of Change (Yijing). In this way he uses
the concept of authenticity to link cosmology and Confucian ethics.
There is significant overlap between the Tongshu and theTaijitu
shuo (above), especially in their discussions of activity and stillness
as the basic expressions of yang and yin. But the Tongshu
is less metaphysical; the emphasis here is on the moral psychology of
the Sage.
[Click here for a complete translation.]

1. Being authentic (cheng)
(A)

Being authentic is the foundation of the Sage. "Great indeed is the
originating [power] of Qian! The myriad things rely on it for their
beginnings."[22] It is the
source of being authentic. "The way of Qian is transformation, with
each [thing] receiving its correct nature and endowment."[23]
In this way authenticity is established. Being pure and flawless, it
is perfectly good. Thus: "The alternation of yin and yang
is called the Way. That which issues from it is good. That which fulfills
it is human nature."[24]
"Origination and development" are the penetration of authenticity;[25]
"adaptation and correctness" are the recovery of authenticity. Great
indeed is change (yi)![26]
It is the source of human nature and endowment.[27]

2. Being authentic (cheng) (B)

Being a Sage is nothing more than being authentic. Being authentic
is the foundation of the Five Constant [Virtues] and the source of the
Hundred Practices. It is imperceptible when [one is] still, and perceptible
when [one is] active;[28]
perfectly correct [in stillness] and clearly pervading [in activity].
When the Five Constants and Hundred Practices are not authentic, they
are wrong; blocked by depravity and confusion.

Therefore one who is authentic has no [need for] undertakings (shi).
It is perfectly easy, yet difficult to practice; when one is determined
and precise, there is no difficulty with it. Therefore [Confucius said],
"If in one day one could subdue the self and return to ritual decorum,
then all under Heaven would recover their humanity."[29]

3. Authenticity, Incipience, and Virtue
(cheng ji de)

In being authentic there is no deliberate action (wuwei).
In incipience (ji) there is good and evil.[30]
As for the [Five Constant] Virtues, loving is called humaneness (ren),
being right is called appropriateness (yi), being principled
(li) is called ritual decorum (li), being penetrating
is called wisdom (zhi), and preserving is called trustworthiness
(hsin). One who is by nature like this, at ease like this, is
called a Sage. One who recovers it and holds onto it is called a Worthy.
One whose subtle signs of expression are imperceptible, and whose fullness
is inexhaustible, is called Spiritual (shen).[31]

That which is "completely silent and inactive"[33]
is authenticity. That which "penetrates when stimulated"[34]
is spirit (shen). That which is active but not yet formed, between
existing and not existing, is incipient.[35]
Authenticity is of the essence (jing), and therefore clear. Spirit
is responsive, and therefore mysterious. Incipience is subtle, and therefore
obscure. One who is authentic, spiritual, and incipient is called a
Sage.[36]

16. Activity and Stillness (dong
jing)

Activity as the absence of stillness and stillness as the absence
of activity characterize things (wu). Activity that is not [empirically]
active and stillness that is not [empirically] still characterize spirit
(shen). Being active and yet not active, still and yet not still,
does not mean that [spirit] is neither active nor still. For while things
do not [inter-]penetrate (tong),[37]
spirit subtly [penetrates/pervades] the myriad things.

The yin of water is based in yang; the yang
of fire is based in yin. The Five Phases are yin and yang;
yin and yang are the Supreme Polarity.[38]
The Four Seasons revolve; the myriad things end and begin [again]. How
undifferentiated! How extensive! And how inexhaustible![39]

20. Learning to be a Sage (sheng
xue)

[Someone asked:] "Can Sagehood be learned?" Reply: It can. "Are there
essentials (yao)?" Reply: There are. "I beg to hear them." Reply:
To be unified (yi)[40]
is essential. To be unified is to have no desire.[41]
Without desire one is vacuous when still and direct in activity. Being
vacuous when still, one will be clear (ming); being clear one
will be penetrating (tong). Being direct in activity one will
be impartial (gong); being impartial one will be all-embracing
(pu). Being clear and penetrating, impartial and all-embracing,
one is almost [a Sage].[42]

NOTES

[1] Another version
credited Cheng Hao with this. See next chapter, Preface to The Mean.
[Back]

[2] For a note on the
translation of taiji as "Supreme Polarity," see the introduction to the
Taijitu shuo below. [Back]

[4]Zhuru mingdao
ji (Writings by Various Confucians for Propagating the Dao), compiled
in the 1160s. [Back]

[5] Nevertheless, Zhu
was not the first to consider Zhou as a founder. Hu Hong (Hu Wufeng, 1105-1155)
had earlier done so, and had written a preface to the Tongshu,
but his edition of the text itself did not survive. Zhu Xi wrote first
drafts of his commentaries on Zhou's works in 1169; they were completed
in 1179 and 1187. [Back]

[6] Zhu Xi used a qualified
genealogical model of the Succession to the Way (daotong) for its
transmission in the Song. But whether he attributed its resumption to
Zhou Dunyi or to Cheng Hao, this repossession of the Way came after a
break of more than a millenium since Mencius, a view similar to Han Yu's
in his essay on the Way (see Ch. 17). Thus Zhu asserted no claim to direct
or continuous genealogical succession (as in the Daoist priesthood from
Zhang Daoling, the first "Heavenly Master") or "from mind to mind" (as
in the patriarchal succession in Chan Buddhism). Zhu was the first to
use the term daotong for a succession that actually meant a reconstituting
or repossessing of the Way. [Back]

[7]Taiji is
usually translated as "Supreme Ultimate" and sometimes as "Supreme Pole,"
but neither of these terms conveys the meaning that both Zhou Dunyi and
Zhu Xi seem to have intended. For example, in both texts translated here,
Zhou identifies the yin-yang polarity as taiji. And Zhu
Xi says: "Change is the alternation of yin and yang. Taiji
is this principle (li)" (Zhu Xi, Zhouyi benyi [The Original
Meaning of the Yijing] [1177; rpt. Taibei: Hualian, 1978], 3:14b,
comment on Xici A.11.5, quoted below). He also insists that taiji
is not a thing (hence "Supreme Pole" will not do). Thus, for both Zhou
and Zhu, taiji is the yin-yang principle of bipolarity,
which is the most fundamental ordering principle, the cosmic "first principle."
Wuji as "non-polar" follows from this. Both are also consistent
with Daoist usage of the terms (see below), with which Zhou must certainly
have been familiar.
For my summary of the Taoist uses of these terms I am heavily indebted
to Isabelle Robinet, “The Place and Meaning of the Notion of Taiji
in Taoist Sources Prior to the Ming Dynasty,” History of Religions,
23, no. 4 (1990), pp. 373-411.[Back]

[11] The line reads
simply, "Wuji er taiji." Since er can mean "and also,"
"and yet," or "under these circumstances," the precise meaning of
the line is far from clear. Another possible translation would be,
"The Supreme Polarity that is non-polar!" It seems to be an expression
of awe and wonder at the paradoxical nature of the ultimate reality.
[Back]

[12] In other words:
seen as a whole system, the Five Phases are based on the yin-yang
polarity; the yin-yang polarity is the Supreme Polarity; and
the Supreme Polarity is fundamentally Non-polar. However, taken individually
as temporal phases, the Five Phases each have their own natures (as
do yin and yang). [Back]

[16] The word shen
can refer either to a deity or to the finest form of qi (psycho-physical
substance), which is capable of penetrating and pervading things and
accounts for human intelligence. See Tongshu (below), chs.
3, 4, and 16. See also Joseph A. Adler, "Varieties of Spiritual Experience:
Shen in Neo-Confucian Discourse," in Confucian Spirituality,
ed. Tu Wei-ming and Mary Evelyn Tucker. Vol. 11 of World Spirituality:
An Encyclopedic History of the Religious Quest, ed. Ewert Cousins
(Crossroad Publ. Co., in press). [Back]

[17] The five-fold
nature consists of the "Five Constant Virtues": humanity (jen),
rightness (yi), propriety (li), wisdom (zhi),
and trustworthiness (xin). They correspond to the Five Phases.
For incipient activity and the differentiation of good and evil, see
Tongshu (below), section 3.[Back]

[18] The two parenthetical
notes are by Zhou; they are taken from Tongshu, section 6 and
section 20 (below). The terms "without desire" and "emphasizing stillness"
were questionable to many Confucians, who usually preferred to speak
of limiting desires (especially selfish desires), but not eliminating
them. Both terms had Buddhist as well as Daoist connotations. [Back]

[25] "Origination,
development, adaptation and correctness" are from the Qian hexagram
text, and came to be known as the "Four Virtues (or Powers)" of Qian
(see Zhouyi benyi, 1:1a). [Back]

[26] This sentence
is the same as the penultimate sentence of the "Explanation," where
yi is interpreted as the Classic of Change rather than
the process of change (following Zhu Xi's readings). But, while the
different readings make sense in their contexts, both meanings were
probably intended by Zhou in both cases. This would reflect a traditional
view (expressed in the Xici appendix of the Classic of Change)
that the hexagrams comprising the core of the text are "spiritual
things" (shenwu); they are manifestations of the cosmic process,
not merely symbols of it. [Back]

[30] As explained
below and in the previous section, the Sage is authentically good
without deliberate effort. "Incipience" is the first subtle stirring
of activity, and the first point at which good and evil can meaningfully
be differentiated. The "Five Constant Virtues" are the full expression
of the innately good nature. [Back]